Read With Caution

during this time of halloween when everyone gets all worked up about being scared and watching frightening movies, my mind reflected back upon a time during my childhood when i endured the longest night of my life. but first some background:

i was the little scared kid all growing up. even my little sis was better at handling the spooky circumstances of growing up in the woods, having older siblings who teased you, the darkness, watching scary movies, dealing with spiders, etc. i had to call her over every time to kill daddy longlegs in my room. she would watch movies wide-eyed while i would be in the corner of the couch with pillow pulled close and fingers half covering (okay, mostly covering) my eyes. how embarrassing is that? i would turn on every light in the house on the way up to my room at night. i would get everything ready so all i had to do was turn off the light in my room and then run and jump real quick into bed. i had a teddy bear that i slept with well into my twenties, and i would place him on the edge of my bed so he would get taken first if something came after us. and when i awoke in the middle of the night and he wasnt by my side, i would debate for minutes on end as to whether i wanted to risk putting my arm down the side of the bed so i could pick him up off the floor, in case something was under the bed and would grab me and pull me under to the dark abyss of nowhere. i would open the closet doors at night so i wouldnt have to worry about them opening up a crack and seeing eyes peeking thru staring at me. i probably lost hours of sleep over the years as i lay awake in bed imagining all the bad things that could happen to me and being too scared for awhile to fall asleep. finally rest would come and eventually the sun would save me, at least for a few hours until night came again to wreak havoc on my consciousness.

i admit, and all my family can attest to, that i hated the dark and scary movies. but i insisted on watching them b/c thats where everyone else would be and i didnt want to be by myself. it took me at least 6 times before i finally made it all the way thru "IT" without closing my eyes. and so this was my mindset as one night our family gathered around the tv to put on a movie i was not prepared for.

oh it starts out nice enough, a pleasant kid who is confined to a wheelchair and is having a grand 'ole time with life. then the moon comes up. but not any kind of moon- a full moon. for those of you familiar with full moons and halloween stories, you can guess the creature i'm about to describe. yes, the werewolf. night descends on this poor unsuspecting town and this beast sets about his business. his business of death! never completely showing itself it carefully, gruesomely goes on in the ways of dismantling and killing the people of this town. unawares, the wheelchair kid decides to try out his new motorized ride his uncle had given him and sneaks out (no, not during the day like any smart person would do) one night. on a bridge he lights fireworks and is having a gay 'ole time (haha, just had to throw in a gay there to completely ruin the mood). alas! the creature is lurking in the nearby woods! it comes out and starts to run after the defenseless child. luckily, just in time, he lights a firework and shoots it at the werewolf just as its about to do him in and he gets the H outta dodge. whew, that was too close for comfort.

the last half of that story about him on the bridge had to be told to me after the scene ended cause i was in all-out cover of eyes, head and body for it. didnt see a thing after the camera angle switched to the werewolfs point of view from the woods. mercifully the movie ends (i'll let you watch it so i dont spoil how it ends) and we head up to bed. i made sure to sandwhich myself between some siblings so i wouldnt be the first one up the stairs or the last one on the end to be snatched away with no one ever noticing. we ready ourselves for a long night of worry and despair at the thought of having to sleep after being horrified half to death. i soon notice that a brother (spencer, i'm sure you were the first one to leave!) grab a pillow and head downstairs. what on earth is that man (moron) thinking? he's seriously gonna leave the comfort and relative safety in numbers to go down to wherever he was going? good riddance to him, nice knowing ya. but wait, others are following suit. such clueless siblings i have! whats wrong with them? i was soon to come to my senses tho after i was the only remaining one. to heck with that, i'm not gonna perish up here all by myself. every single one of us, all 8 kids, went downstairs to sleep in my parents room. what genious! they would protect us from the evils lurking outside, and apparently upstairs.

the oldest, and bravest in my book, brandon took the couch right next to the window. crazy man, but hats off to ya cause i would never have placed myself in such precarious circumstances. yep, i grabbed a spot right next to my parents bed. it would have to go thru 7 others before it got to me, and hopefully by the time it did it would be tired, full, or disinterested- or me and the parents would have escaped by then. thus me and teddy braced ourselves for the night with this on our minds:




















*can you guys blame me for praying not to have bad dreams or nightmares every single night?